


unlearning is a process

by iceprinceofbelair



Series: subtleties [3]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Gen, Healing, past emotional abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-21
Updated: 2017-07-21
Packaged: 2018-12-05 03:26:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11569317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iceprinceofbelair/pseuds/iceprinceofbelair
Summary: Viktor needs quite a bit of reassurance sometimes.





	unlearning is a process

Yuuri likes spending time with Viktor in silence. They can curl up on the couch together for hours, on their phones or reading or just existing together and Yuuri thinks it’s the most valuable and rewarding time he’s ever spent with another person. He’s in love with Viktor and spending time with him feels as natural as a bee sleeping in a flower. 

Makkachin is snoozing on the other side of the room, thoroughly pooped from her walk earlier. Her presence makes this time spent with Viktor feel all the more domestic. It makes Yuuri’s heart happy.

What doesn’t make his heart happy, however, is when Viktor says quietly, “Yuuri? I’m not...I’m not a bad person, am I?”

Yuuri almost chokes. “Of course not, Vitya,” he says, pushing his fingers into Viktor’s hair to comfort his clearly distressed fiance. “What brought this on?”

Viktor looks uncertainly at Yuuri’s face for a moment but he seems to be satisfied with what he finds there because the tense line of his jaw relaxes slightly and he sighs. “I was just thinking that I haven’t visited my parents in years now and I don’t really want to.”

“Oh,” Yuuri says. Viktor doesn’t often speak about his parents aside from the odd - and thankfully vague - plan to pay them a visit sometime. “That doesn’t make you a bad person. From what you’ve told me, they didn’t exactly make you feel safe and welcome the last few times you tried.”

Viktor hums noncommittally. 

“I know but I don’t think they meant to make me feel like that,” he says and Yuuri can’t stand to hear him make excuses. 

He knows that Viktor’s parents weren’t exactly shoving him down staircases or withholding food but there is no doubt in his mind that they were distinctly lacking in many ways. They withheld other things from him - love and acceptance sometimes - and Yuuri hates that they were so successful at what they did. To this day they make their son question whether her has any right to be upset about it and that breaks Yuuri’s heart in a thousand ways.

Years of being taught that negative emotions were unacceptable have taken what will probably be a lifelong toll. Viktor is learning to accept how he feels. But Yuuri wonders how much sooner he’d have sought help for his depression if he hadn’t been made to feel so guilty for being upset about anything in his childhood. It makes him angry to think that Viktor went through years of soul-crushing guilt for being  _ sick  _ because he thought he wasn’t allowed to feel the way he did. 

Yuuri knows that his own parents would have raised Viktor like they raised him - to believe that it was  _ okay  _ to be upset about things that mattered to him. They didn’t mock him when he cried about Viktor failing to make the podium at his first senior division competition because they understood that wanting something so badly, rooting for someone as hard as Yuuri had been rooting for Viktor, made it difficult to accept.

“If it hurts, that means it matters,” Hiroko had told him when he was seven and had had an argument with Yuuko.

He tries to imagine Viktor’s life growing up without that base understanding of emotions and their purpose. Yuuri knows that Viktor is frightened of anger, of sadness, of loneliness; he never learned what those emotions were  _ for.  _ Nobody ever told him that being angry about something meant he was passionate. Nobody ever told him that being sad meant something mattered. Nobody ever told him that being lonely meant he was human.

More than anything, Yuuri wishes he and Viktor could have grown up together. He wishes Viktor could have learned all of this long before it became a problem. 

Yuuri sees Viktor wrestling with this even now. He sees Viktor pushing down his disappointment when things go wrong. He sees Viktor forcing a smile when it’s obvious he wants to cry. 

And it absolutely kills Yuuri inside.

“Even if they didn’t mean it, they still hurt you,” Yuuri reassures him. “It’s not wrong for you to be upset. You’re allowed to feel hurt.”

Viktor doesn’t seem convinced. “It’s not like they ever  _ really  _ hurt me though.”

Yuuri wants to cry with frustration because  _ they did hurt you, Vitya, I can see it and I hate them.  _ Instead of saying this, however, Yuuri kisses Viktor’s hair. 

“I know it’s hard to accept, love,” he says, pulling Viktor’s body close. “I can’t imagine all the contradictions you’ve got in your head but if you remember one thing, I want you to remember this; you are always allowed to express your emotions around me. Always.”

This seems to have been the right thing to say because Viktor curls closer with a pained sigh. “Thank you,” he chokes. “Thank you.”


End file.
